ten feet tall and then the leaf dies and the tuber lies dormant again.”
“Really?” I gave in to the yawn. “I never saw it in your apartment before you moved back to this house. The pot itself would have taken up half your living room. And your ceiling wasn’t even eight feet high, so …”
“Button it, will you? A friend was keeping it for me, okay? Now then, the last month or so, when I was expecting the leaf to start growing again, it didn’t.”
He pulled a battered cigarette out of his pocket and lit it.
“When did you start smoking? And why? I don’t understand you, Dougal. You’re going to croak before you hit forty, between your appalling diet and now smoking.”
He ignored me and sucked in the smoke. “This time is different. The Titan is producing an inflorescence that consists of the spadix — the tall column you saw in the pot — and a spathe — the green, furrowed structure wrapped around the base. Soon, thousands of tiny flowers, both male and female, will form at the base of the spadix, and the spathe will unfurl around them. The spathe will be dark red on the inside — I saw one years ago when I was in England, at the Kew Royal Botanic Gardens, and it was spectacular. Now, I may have a chance to observe it right in my own house.” His eyes sparkled with excitement as he waved the crumpled cigarette in my direction.
“That’s fascinating, but I still don’t see where I come in. I don’t know much about plants, but if this one has male and female flowers, why can’t it pollinate itself?”
“That rarely happens, and I don’t want to chance it. We need the pollen from another Titan. After a successful pollination, the plant then produces fruit, which, in turn, produces the seeds. The mature seeds are called tubers.”
“And that’s what you want me to do? Find you another giant, ugly plant? I wouldn’t know where to begin to look. I don’t think this is a realistic plan, Dougal.”
“Will you listen? I know where another Titan is.”
“Where? And what makes you think this other one is going to flower at the same time as yours? You said they can go years without …”
“I don’t know, not for sure. But the other Titan comes from the same mother plant. Our tubers are the same age, and there’s a chance the other one will be at the same stage of sexual development.” He took another pull on his unfiltered cigarette.
My ears started to burn. I had the same feeling before when I was about to do something stupid, like the day I got married. I ignored it that time, and look how my life turned out.
“So, Dougal. If I understand the situation correctly, you have a plant that may or may not flower. Someone else, as yet unnamed, has another plant that may or may not flower. You are willing to pay me a thousand dollars to ensure a successful pollination. Sorry, but I think buying a lottery ticket would give me better odds.”
“This is a win-win situation for you, Bliss. I will pay you in full if the other Titan is also about to blossom and you talk the owner into pollinating both plants. You’ll get the money even if the pollination doesn’t work.”
“Is there some reason you can’t contact the other owner and arrange this for yourself?”
“There’s a pretty good reason.”
“What is it?”
“I used to be married to her, and she hates my guts.”
“Glory? Glory has one of these hideous plants?”
He said reproachfully, “Don’t talk like that. They have names.”
“Dougal!”
“Okay. Before Glory and I were married, two tubers came into our possession, never mind how. When we split up, I took Thor and she took Sif. I moved into my own place and had a friend with a greenhouse keep Thor for me until I built the solarium here. There, that’s the whole story. Once the spathe unfurls completely, the male and female flowers will ripen within a day of each other.”
Dougal leaned back and stretched his lanky legs farther out on the chair. He was still smoking and looking unusually relaxed for an agoraphobic whose Titan Arum was about to embark on sexual maturity with no nubile mate in sight. Although he was a foot taller and had at least sixty pounds on me, I sometimes felt like Dougal’s mother. Not that I had any experience as a parent.
“What’s a Sif? I know Thor was some mythical god, but …”
“Thor is a Germanic god of war, and Sif is his wife. At the time, Glory and I thought it was romantic. Are there any other questions before I continue?”
“I guess not.” Although, considering what happened between Glory and Dougal, naming the plants after a war god and his wife had turned out to be more prophetic than romantic.
“Right. Since you clean Glory’s house, you have an excellent opportunity to find out if her Titan is ready to bloom. If it isn’t, well, no harm done, and no point even mentioning it to her.”
“Dougal, I clean Glory’s house on Wednesday mornings. This is only Saturday. I can’t go over there uninvited. We aren’t exactly social equals anymore.”
“You can’t wait until Wednesday — Thor might bloom before then! And Sif could be even farther along in development, or behind. I need to know so I can plan. You’ll have to find some excuse to go over there.”
“But I’ve never seen anything like your Titan in Glory’s house. You can’t miss something that resembles a gigantic …”
“Look in the greenhouse at the back of the house. That’s where we used to keep the pair.”
“Glory never leaves me alone in her house. I’ve never been in the backyard, not even when you two were married.”
“Damnations, Bliss! I’m trying to pay you a thousand dollars. Can’t you show a little initiative?”
I was about to tell him where he could stick my initiative. Then I stopped and sniffed. My olfactory sense was second to no one’s, at times to a fault. “Something smells funny in here. How old are those cigarettes?”
“Are you going to do it or not? Remember your Indict the Weasel Fund.”
As of today, an emergency root canal would wipe out the Fund. “Okay, I’ll try. I guess.”
“Your enthusiasm is inspirational. No time like the present, so go now, my little minion.”
“I can’t. Tonight’s the only night I have free to do my laundry. And don’t call me a minion.”
“You can use my washer and dryer later tonight, after you see Glory.”
“I’m really tired. I’ve been working at the cemetery all day.”
“Then go tomorrow, but that’s leaving it a little late.”
“Can’t. I have a real estate client tomorrow. I’m showing the Barrister house in the afternoon. And you can’t expect me to visit Glory on Sunday morning.”
Before
